According to Pete Sampson of The Athletic, a “strong candidate” has emerged in Notre Dame’s search to replace Al Golden as defensive coordinator.

Despite the hopes of many, that candidate is not current Notre Dame defensive backs coach Mike Mickens.

Instead it is former Rutgers head coach Chris Ash.

Ash is 51 years old and has spent the last three decades in coaching that has included stints in both major college football and the NFL as well as being the head coach at Rutgers for four seasons.

Ash spent the start of his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Drake before making the leap to Iowa State. He spent one year at San Diego State as well before joining Bret Bielema’s staff at Wisconsin. Ash spent four seasons with Bielema before joining Ohio State as co-defensive coordinator in 2014, a year the Buckeyes won the national championship.

Ash spent 2016-19 as Rutgers head coach but had little success in the role, going just 8-32 in his time.

He then joined the University of Texas staff as an analyst before becoming its defensive coordinator and safeties coach.

Ash spent 2021 with the Jacksonville Jaguars before spending two seasons with the Las Vegas Raiders, but was a pro scout and not a coach for Jacksonville this past year.

I won’t pretend to have sources that are telling me anything regarding if Ash (fi you do then my DM’s are always open) is the guy or not but if he ends up being the choice there are a lot of commonalities between him and Al Golden when Golden took the job.

Ash brings head coaching experience that no other assistant coach on the staff has while he also was a longtime college guy who struggled as a head coach but had great success as a coordinator. Like Golden when hired in 2022, Ash would be going back to the college ranks after spending a few years in the NFL.

Perhaps most interesting of it is that a quick look at Ash’s resume shows a guy who has spent the vast majority of his career working with defensive backs. It’s one thing to be keying in on someone to run the defense over internal candidate Mike Mickens, but it’s entirely another to pursue someone with such a background coaching defensive backs when Mickens is still employed.

Or is the thought that Mickens might be off to greener pastures soon?

Certainly, something to keep an eye on as we’ll be monitoring this as it continues to develop.

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